Health-care promise is now reality

Marcia Angell, former editor-in-chief of The New England Journal of Medicine, has offered an objective "big picture" view of the Affordable Care Act.

I paraphrase: Financing ACA as now written cannot be sustained. The law leaves the for-profit private insurance industry in place and promises it millions of new customers. This will be too costly and inflationary to sustain. As premiums rise, coverage will shrink; insurance companies will inevitably find ways around regulations requiring them to insure the unhealthy.

Dr. Angell offers a solution: Extend Medicare to everyone by dropping the qualifying age a decade at a time. We can hope. Now, entitlement has actually begun; the ACA is a reality. The value of healing the sick held by an individual and by a nation is a value to be proud of.

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISEMENT

Email this article

Health-care promise is now reality

Marcia Angell, former editor-in-chief of The New England Journal of Medicine, has offered an objective 'big picture' view of the Affordable Care Act.